Disability Pride

It's disability pride month, so I wanted to make a post that is a little different. I want to share my strengths and possible strengths of other people with disabilities. When people hear the word disability, they assume negative symptoms, but we just have different strengths. There are a lot of different types of disabilities, but I am going to focus on autism for this post because it is what I am diagnosed with.

I believe one of my biggest strengths is punctuality. I am usually on time or early when meeting someone or getting to appointments. I am really good with time management and I have noticed a lot of people struggle with that. It's something I am proud of myself for.

I am also very creative. I think this is a common strength among people with autism. In my case, I'm very good with writing and I enjoy painting. I also know a lot of people with autism who like to draw. A lot of the people I know who are creative are also very good at what they do. I love seeing creative minds work together.

A lot of people with autism are very observant. I know a lot of us struggle to communicate clearly, but this gives us the opportunity to quietly observe what is going on around us. We may pay more attention to detail than the average person. This could help with reliability as well.

I believe I am very non-judgmental. I think that is one of my biggest strengths as well. I try my best to understand people and why they do the things they do even if it doesn't make complete sense to me. I think curiosity is another strength for a lot of autistic people. We ask a lot of questions because we want to understand.

I want to be honest and say this post was hard to make. We often pay attention to our weaknesses more than our strengths, but it is important to notice both. I know I didn't have a lot to say either, but just being able to recognize some is a win for me. I used to only focus on my negative symptoms and this forced me to think positive. Please share some of your strengths with me, so people know they exist. Thanks for reading!